I served in the Army for three years between 1968 and 1970. I remember the “Chain of Command” being drilled into our shaved young heads in basic training -- working from the squad leader up to the platoon leader on to the company commander, and so on, through the Battalion, Division and up onto the heights of the Secretary of the Army, the Secretary of Defense, and finally the Commander-in-Chief, the President himself. At the time it was LBJ. Today it is George W Bush. The thing that sticks with me is not the names but the sense of a direct link of command and responsibility. A chain that linked LBJ, and me; we were in the army together. He was my commander. We fought in the same war. He might be a lot farther from the enemy guns, but he was the one who was in command. I went where he said to go; I did what he said to do.
Any man or woman in the army is subject to what was called then the Uniform Code of Military Justice. This was a military judicial system, a code of laws, if you will, not much different than civilian law in that it governed everything from murder to petty theft, but with a whole series of rules regarding conduct in time of war. It governed desertion, dereliction of duty, mutiny and the likes, and proscribed harsh punishments for infractions of these rules. This was a whole and encompassing legal and moral dictate for soldiers severely restricting freedoms and activities open to the civilian population. For example, civilians don’t have to worry about leaving their job, they can say I quit and walk a way. A soldier on the other hand will be imprisoned if he decides to up and call it a day. So with some good reason, there is a whole set of rules imposed on soldiers that most of us don’t have to think about.
I can speak from personal experience about a certain rule against sleeping on guard duty. In the winter of 1968 while stationed in Phu Loi, Vietnam with the First Infantry Division 1st Aviation Battalion, I was on perimeter guard duty where we installed ourselves in heavily fortified bunkers, and steel plated machine gun towers with mines and barbwire out in front of our positions. Our mission was to defend the base against occasional forays and probes by VC soldiers. Mostly it was a boring twelve hours of waiting and watching. Still we were what stood between the hostile forces out there, outside the wire, and the men sleeping or pulling some night duty inside the wire. We were armed to the teeth and ready. Mostly nothing happened so the two men on duty in each bunker or tower took turns sleeping, one on, and one off, through the night. This was against regulations, a criminal offense by the Code, but completely acceptable behavior in the eyes of all the enlisted men who nightly set up to defend the camp. So as enlisted men are apt to do, we made our own rules: one slept, one stood guard. No one ever came out on the line to check. The officers were more afraid of being shot by us by accident than of breaches of security.
On a night a few days after Christmas my partner and I manned the main tower as we did every night. I took the first watch and he slept on the floor. After two hours I woke him, handed him the watch and stretched out on the floor pulling my field jacket over my head and fell right to sleep. Later in the night I bolted awake from the sound of a pistol being fired inside the tower. Fortunately, and unfortunately, it was the Major in charge of the perimeter; there was that old chain of command again, fresh from the States and eager to do his job. It was fortunate because it wasn’t a VC sapper and I was alive, unfortunate because my partner had fallen asleep slumped over the 60-caliber machine gun. In the morning we were both removed from duty and confined to quarters while we awaited a court martial. Not a pleasant occurrence in my young life.
Like all of us, I've been thinking a lot since September 11 about the safety of our country. In assessing where this country has been in regards to world terrorism for the past five to ten years, it seems to me that we are much like that base camp. We have a perimeter and defensive positions and a new enemy, the terrorist, who lives and functions pretty freely outside the “wire”. Intelligence tries to see what they are up to and provide warnings. The current uproar over who knew what and when speaks directly to that image of wire and perimeter and guards.
The Commander-in-Chief, George W Bush is the head of the perimeter guard responsible for keeping the people inside the wire safe or at the least spreading the alarm if the perimeter is being probed or god forbid, breached. In my opinion, George W Bush’s conduct in the pre- September 11th months constitutes sleeping on duty. That some will say is being soft on the poor devil, because if he weren’t asleep then he would have to be charged with either dereliction of duty or treason. The first is a failure to perform one’s duty or a neglect of duty. It is the failure to act for the best good of the country, a failure to protect, to warn those inside the wire, those in the “base camp” going about their lives, thinking themselves safe. It is a failure to act knowing that he should. The second alternative is even worse, that he knew what might happen and let it happen to gain political advantage, to push through his programs for military expansion and extraordinary executive power. Such action, in my view, would constitute treason. But since neither charge would likely prove out or be palpable to the Senators and Congressmen who would be charged to investigate the affair, it seems appropriate to charge Bush with sleeping on duty. How else is it that a series of probes of the perimeter took place without his knowledge? The enemy was at the wire. The CIA warned of intense activity, a government study told of Al-Qaeda plans in Paris and the Philippines to hijack planes and fly them into buildings. The enemy forces had already breached the wire. The forces of Al-Qaeda were in several flight schools; an FBI agent in Phoenix had communicated to Bush’s subordinates the exact nature of the threat naming AL-Qaeda specifically. The enemy was inside the wire. Our Commander knew this. And still, no warning was sounded. It was too general we are now told. How is untrained pilots of Saudi nationality who want to learn only how to fly a plane and not to land it "general"?
Put it all together. The perimeter was breached; other enemy forces were sighted trying to get into the country. The enemy communication links were buzzing. Something was up. The FBI had spotted people training in flight school to fly huge commercial airliners who had no basic flight skills, one of whom announced he didn’t care to learn to land. And what did George our Commander-in-Chief choose to do? He chose to go on vacation, leaving the orders to for a preemptive strike against Osma Bin Laden sitting on his desk. He chose to go for a long nap, a little well deserved rest. He chose to ignore the warnings; he was tired; he had a big job; he needed his rest. Intelligence warned that the enemy might strike. Where on the wire wasn’t certain but old George kept sleeping away. He said we don’t know when it will be or where they will strike. How can we tell it's the real thing, anyway? They probe all the time. Let me be. I am resting can’t you see. How else can his failure to warn, to protect, his people be explained? The other options are too ghastly. Stupidity is no excuse before the law, and certainly George isn’t stupid. Rather clever I’d say. So George must have been fallen asleep.
Therefore I propose that the next in line in the chain of command, the Secretary of Defense, Mr. Rumsfeld himself, (a hard taskmaster if ever there was one) should seize the President in his office or maybe while he’s napping. Then he should be confined to quarters and Mr. Rumsfeld should start a summary court martial of the man responsible for the perimeter of this country who stood between the enemy and us and carelessly snoozed away while planes hurled towards the horrible events of September 11th.
Sincerely,
John B Hopkins
Combat Veteran
May 1968- May 1969
Aerial Surveillance Target Acquisition Platoon
1st Aviation Battalion
1st Infantry Division
Want to respond? Leave feedback? Use the button below:
Jump to:
John's Page
Synergy Essays
Synergy Home
